The other day I came across an interview with
Pete Winemiller, vice president of guest relations for the NBA's Seattle
Supersonics and the WNBA's Seattle Storm, and something he said got
me thinking about the meaning of "marketing excellence." He said, "I'm
a firm believer that a complaint is a gift—it's free consulting.
I want to hear what's going on and I want to solve that problem in
the moment if I can." He went on to say that when a company acts on
information like this and does things differently, customers know that
their input matters. And in a world like ours, where customers have
choices upon choices upon choices, this is important.
To me, excellence is action. I heard it in the presentations that
marketing leaders from SAP, Unisys, Alcatel-Lucent, IBM, Rockwell Automation,
Pitney Bowes, and Tata gave at ITSMA's Marketing Leadership Forum a
couple of weeks ago, and I heard it in Winemiller's interview the other
day. Action. Change. Making things happen. Getting things done.
The world is always changing. There are always new things that'll
need to get done. Marketers who set intelligent goals and drive to
them relentlessly are the ones who achieve excellence. If this describes
you, make sure you tell us what you've done by submitting an entry
to our Marketing Excellence Awards program. The deadline is coming
up fast (Friday, June 15), so if you haven't already done so, take
a look at the award
guidelines and start writing. Best of luck!
The weather was beautiful, the view of San Francisco was stunning, and
the level of participation from the attendees of ITSMA's recent Marketing
Leadership Forum was perhaps the best we've ever seen. Titled Accelerating
the Solutions Business, the Forum provided an in-depth look at the
innovative ways that companies today are developing, marketing, and selling
solutions.
John Hagel, a global strategist who's just joined Deloitte to found and
serve as co-chairman of a major new Silicon Valley-based research center,
pointed out in his keynote speech that, although "solutions" is often
a code name for bundling, "successful solutions are not products writ
large… They are a platform for collaborating with customers to meet their
specific needs." Companies that share this view of solutions, said Hagel,
recognize that a successful solutions business is based on trust-based
relationships with customers and partners, since providers need to work
collaboratively with both groups to develop truly innovative solutions.
He suggested that virtual communities are an excellent—but underused—tool
for building the trust-based relationships that are required for the solutions
business to flourish.
Mark Yolton, vice president of SAP's community network, has seen first-hand
how effectively online communities foster co-innovation and collaboration.
Yolton oversees the SAP Developer Network and the company's Business Process
Expert Community, which, together, have over 800,000 members. During his
presentation, he explained that the communities give customers the opportunity
to "collaborate with SAP and third-party vendors to share best practices
and encourage these providers to build the products and features they
need most. The community engagement leads customers to solutions that
are right for their business."
Alcatel-Lucent, meanwhile, recognizes that it's not only its own customers
it needs to focus on. According to Karl Bream, vice president of corporate
strategic marketing, the more knowledgeable the company becomes about
its customers' customers, the more valuable the solutions it can develop
and sell. Alcatel-Lucent has substantially increased its investment in
end-user research and, as a result, is now better able to articulate the
value of its solutions to its customers—telecommunications service providers.
Over the last two years, IBM's solutions marketing team has looked to
improve the customer experience by integrating and coordinating its solutions
marketing programs. In 2006, the team executed a pilot focused on one
solutions area, reducing overlap by consolidating thirteen separate
marketing programs into one, which ensured coordination around messaging
and the number of customer touches. The company then designed a client-focused
framework for integration and moved the resources and funding for solutions
from the silos into a solutions marketing pool. According to Joann Duguid,
IBM's vice president of solutions and sector marketing in the Americas,
"Pooling the solutions resources has been a critical success factor. We
now have dedicated funding for our overall company priorities for solutions
instead of having each business unit off doing its own thing."
Tata Consultancy Services is also working hard to ensure alignment within
the company, especially among sales, marketing, delivery, and the practices.
As chief transformation officer, Vish Viswanathan is at the center of
Tata's "Perfect Storm"—the code name senior management has given to
the change program. First, the company made a blueprint of processes,
metrics, service levels, ownership, responsibility, and accountability,
to increase collaboration and alignment within the organization. Now
it's in the midst of institutionalizing the blueprint, training functional
owners, and doing road shows to build internal awareness of the changes.
Steve Garrou, director of global outsourcing and infrastructure services
at Unisys, is literally focused on "accelerating" the solutions business
by speeding up the solutions development process. Whereas the company
used to conduct the four steps of its development process—market assessment,
technical and operational validation, offering development, and life-cycle
management—in sequence, it now assesses the market and does the technical
and operational validation in parallel. Thanks to the changes, Unisys
is now able to develop new solutions significantly faster, with
more intensive focus from the development teams.
When Terry Gebert, vice president and general manager of Rockwell Automation's
manufacturing and process solutions, first arrived at Rockwell, the
company was pushing to "productize" its solutions, hoping to create
and sell more packaged, off-the-shelf solutions. But Gebert knew this
wasn't the way to improve the company's solutions business. "Customers
don't want generic solutions," he said. "At too many companies, the
solutions business is the black hole for bundled products. That's not
what we needed." Instead
of focusing on providing predefined offerings with little ability for
customization, Gebert has been focused on creating repeatable solutions
development processes and methods. By giving the delivery teams standardized
processes, Rockwell is able to ensure efficient development and delivery,
while allowing for true tailoring and customizing based upon the customer's
unique challenges and business model. The other lever that Terry has
pulled to improve their solutions business has been to better arm the
sales force to sell true solutions by providing them with new skills
and tools that allow them to talk about value rather than features and
benefits.
Pitney Bowes is also focused on making sure its sales reps are fully
trained. Bob Mattis, vice president of managed services, said that his
division requires extensive training for everyone in the field who is
involved with solutions, including sales, operations, and consulting.
The training includes eight hours of online coursework, a three-day, in-person
training class, and in-the-field training that must be completed before
the participants receive their final certification. (Compensation is tied
to certification.) Mattis said that 70% of the sales force for the division
has turned over since the company implemented the new training program,
but he also said that the results for Pitney Bowes' solutions have improved
substantially: Written business, average order size, and cross-selling
are all up significantly.
All in all, it was a fascinating event with a number of extremely interesting
takeaways. If you're involved with solutions and are kicking yourself
for not making it to the Forum, please consider attending our upcoming
Solutions
Workshop, which will take place in mid-July at Babson's Executive
Conference Center in Wellesley, MA.
New
Thinking
How Customers Choose Solutions: An Interview with ITSMA's Julie Schwartz
Julie Schwartz, senior vice president of thought leadership and research
at ITSMA, recently presented the findings from our 2007 study of how customers
choose solutions providers, sharing how the vendor selection criteria
have changed and what providers can do to win more business.
ITSMA: Julie, five years ago, prior experience with
a company was the most important factor in choosing a solutions provider.
But your recent report shows that this has now become the least important
factor. What has contributed to this change?
Schwartz: With the rise of globalization and offshoring, customers
today have so many more choices than they did even five years ago. They
also have access to much more information, and the cost of gathering this
information—and acting on it—has decreased significantly. So, prior experience
with a provider is no longer required to feel confident that the provider
can get the job done. Altogether, the rise of available information and
the increased number of players have empowered customers.
ITSMA: What can providers do to counteract this decrease
in customer loyalty?
Schwartz: The top factors driving customer loyalty are reliability,
competence, and responsiveness. Providers that embody these qualities
mitigate the customer's risk. Above all, providers need to deliver the
highest-quality solutions possible. They also need to know the customer's
business inside and out and respond quickly and effectively to customer
needs.
When customers begin to search for a provider, their top source of information
is their professional colleagues and peers. Therefore, it's vital for
providers to focus on fostering community. If you're delivering a high-quality
customer experience, you want your customers to talk to each other and
to prospects. A few ways to facilitate and participate in this dialogue
include:
User groups
Advisory councils
Online communities
Executive events
Employee blogging programs
Additionally, providers must ensure that there is valuable content available
wherever potential customers look for information, whether it's on the
Web, in the press, at industry conferences, or elsewhere. Thought leadership,
therefore, is key.
ITSMA: Although price falls low on the list of vendor
selection criteria, the research also shows that buyers today are more
willing to experiment with low-cost providers. This seems contradictory.
What's going on?
Schwartz: It used to be that low cost was equated with poor quality.
But now, with globalization and the advent of offshoring, the connotation
of “low cost” has changed. Customers today don't base their decisions
on price; they base their decisions on which provider will reduce their
risk the most and be the best cultural fit. Only after these needs are
met does price become a factor.
ITSMA: What should solutions providers do to increase
the opportunity funnel and win more business?
Schwartz: We've identified five key steps that marketing should
take to increase opportunities and better reach prospective customers:
Orchestrate a customer experience that creates advocates. Keep
your existing customers happy and loyal, and create evidence of a track
record.
Invest in customer relationship programs. High-touch, content-rich
customer relationship programs such as executive-level business events,
user groups, and private briefings have proven to be some of the most
effective methods.
Influence new and traditional influencers. Reputation is extremely
important. In addition to the traditional influencers such as journalists
and industry analysts, companies today must also pay attention to academics,
bloggers, and independent consultants, among others.
Balance push and pull marketing. Customers want to buy; they
don’t want to be sold to. In spite of this, push marketing can still
be effective, as long as it is targeted and relevant. To reach the maximum
number of potential customers, marketers should invest in both push
and pull activities.
Employ segment and Account-Based Marketing (ABM). Customers
need assurance that you will solve their unique business problems. The
deep research that is required to effectively implement segment marketing
and ABM will build buyer confidence by positioning your company as an
expert that truly understands the buyer's needs.
On
the Job
Building Relationships in China: Accenture's 2006 Global Convergence Forum
With the growing importance of Asia in the global economic marketplace,
Accenture knew that it needed to grow its presence in the region—particularly
in China. In 2003, the company provided formal Chinese cultural training
to all its Communications & High Technology marketing professionals. In
2004 and 2005, it held Executive Advisory Committee meetings in Shanghai.
But it was Accenture's decision to hold its 2006 Global Convergence Forum
(GCF)—its largest and most important customer-facing event of the year—in
Beijing that truly marked the company's strategic move into the Chinese
marketplace. The 2006 GCF provided Accenture with a unique opportunity
to define a new geographic customer segment and target the program to
meet these customers' needs. At the same time, the company also strengthened
relationships with current customers who were interested in exploring
the effect of globalization and who wanted an inside glimpse of what is
required to do business in China.
Gaining "Guanxi"
In the Chinese business world, the concept of "guanxi"—a network of relationships
that are strong on both a business and personal level—is extremely important.
According to The
Los Angeles Chinese Learning Center, "this reliance on relationships
means that western companies have to make themselves known to the Chinese
before any business can take place."
As a vehicle to grow its presence in China, Accenture made every effort
to build the proper foundations for the 2006 GCF. In China, there is a
law that states that if a non-Chinese company wants to bring more than
150 foreign nationals into the country for an event, that event must be
sponsored by a Chinese company or "host." There are many paid hosting
organizations in China, but for the long-term benefit of Accenture in
China, the GCF team quickly realized that they needed to increase their
"guanxi" and find the right host.
"Finding the right host was the most difficult, time-consuming, and personally
demanding challenge we faced," said Michele Ruane, a senior manager within
Accenture's Communications & High Tech marketing group. To accomplish
the task, she said, the company launched an extensive campaign to build
relationships with the Chinese government, with Accenture's CEO taking
personal responsibility to ensure success. The team dedicated itself to
understanding the protocol and complexity of doing business in China and
undertook great efforts to follow the guidance of advisors and Accenture's
Chinese executives, eventually gaining the endorsement and sponsorship
of a key Chinese government agency: the Ministry of Information Industry.
In total, it took 18 months to resolve the hosting issue.
Executing the Event
The 2006 GCF provided Accenture with a unique opportunity to define a
new geographic customer segment and target the GCF program to meet these
customers' needs. To do this, Accenture worked with its host organizations
to leverage their market knowledge and contacts, relocating a marketing
manager from Accenture's Atlanta office to Beijing in October 2005 to
help with the effort. The end result was the development of a client database
with 350 new Chinese contacts. In addition, the effort helped the company
fill in the gaps in its staffing in China and bring in additional people
to answer this market segment's needs.
The execution of the event required a large dedication of resources from
within the company. Particularly significant were the development and
execution of a comprehensive marketing plan for Accenture and the 2006
GCF in China. This plan included:
The purchase of the Accenture.cn domain name and new Chinese language
content
Accenture's first online marketing program in China
The creation of hard- and soft-copy collateral in three languages:
English, Chinese, and Japanese
Advertising campaigns in Chinese publications
PR and media campaigns resulting in six articles published about GCF
prior to the event
An internal communications and cultural education campaign, including
over 60 separate mailings between June 2005 and May 2006 and culminating
in onsite cultural training for both clients and Accenture executives
At the event itself, Accenture offered a number of networking opportunities
(in addition to the plenary, breakout, and other GCF sessions) that allowed
attendees to experience Beijing's historical and cultural landmarks, including
a dinner event at the Great Wall of China, tours of Beijing's landmarks,
and a dinner event at the Forbidden City. Several of these events required
special government permission to access the cultural sites. Thus, attendees
were treated to many impressive once-in-a-lifetime experiences.
Results
The 2006 GCF set records for attendance, delegate feedback ratings, media
participation, and anticipated new business; 337 senior client executives
attended the event, exceeding expectations by roughly 25%. One hundred
percent of the attendees found the conference a valuable use of their
time, and 96% of them indicated that the theme of the 2006 GCF was relevant
to their business needs.
The 2006 GCF provided not only additional business but unquantifiable
opportunities to build and strengthen relationships with Accenture targets
and clients. Perhaps most important, the success of the program put Accenture
on the map in China and established it as a company with the resources,
dedication, professionalism, and services to get the job done.
EuroNotes
Improving Marketing's Collaboration with Finance: Tips from ITSMA's European Marketing Forum
During this year's European Marketing Forum, Delivering Value: Marketing
in Action, Paul Newton, finance and planning executive for IBM Global
Services in North East Europe, joined ITSMA's Tim Shercliff in one of
the plenary sessions to explore how marketers can raise their game in
the sometimes daunting area of communicating with finance departments.
According to Newton, effective communication, focus, and measurable delivery
are essential elements of the new marketing mix.
Here are a few of the session's other key takeaways:
Collaboration counts. Finance and marketing need to work more
closely together to understand each other's strengths and perspectives
from an early stage in the business cycle. It is not enough to wait
until budget time for engaging in debate on funding and the focus of
marketing activities, because by this time too many other factors will
be clouding the debate. Successful collaboration results in a forward-looking
business plan that is fact-based and invests for growth where market
opportunity lies.
It's all about money. Marketing should harness the power of
finance's focus on making money, its processes, and its discipline to
ensure strong linkage between marketing activities and business results.
When approaching a discussion with finance, it is helpful to structure
the information and content in a format that is pertinent to finance
rather than woolly statements and pictures. For example, marketing should
quantify sales quotas and incentive plans supporting the introduction
of new solutions and services to market.
Take time to understand. The communication challenge cuts both
ways. Marketing needs to speak the language of finance, but the finance
team should also take more time and trouble to understand the marketplace,
which will enable better and more valuable interaction with the marketing
and sales teams. Ultimately, when both functions are working together
effectively, 1 + 1 really can equal 3!
In addition to Newton's plenary session, the Forum (which was sponsored
by BT Global Services) included keynote presentations on "The Power of
Partnering," "Innovative Marketing," and "The Future of Services Marketing."
Complementing the plenary sessions were interactive workshops where delegates
were able to hear firsthand from experienced practitioners and discuss
case studies on how to:
Strengthen sales and marketing collaboration through Account-Based
Marketing
Develop personal networking skills
Transform an organisation from product to solutions focus
Leverage the power of customer communities
Throughout the event there were numerous opportunities for networking
and knowledge sharing that allowed individuals to forge new relationships
and build on old ones—strengthening the marketing community that makes
ITSMA so special.
My thanks go out to all those who contributed to the success of this
event through their active participation and willingness to share practical
experiences, advice, knowledge, and views.
Research Desk
Ask ITSMA: How Can We Build a Solid Customer Loyalty Program?
Each month, ITSMA receives a number of queries through Ask
ITSMA, a resource designed to give members a quick and easy
way to get insight on important services and solutions marketing
questions they face. In this column, we will publish some of our
favorite questions along with excerpts from our replies.
Question: We are interested in building a customer loyalty
program. What approach would you recommend?
Answer: Companies need to take a number of steps to build effective
loyalty programs. First, it's important to assess what your company
is already doing to measure and improve customer satisfaction and loyalty.
The following questions are a good place to start:
Are existing satisfaction or loyalty programs/activities in place
at your company? How are they measured? Are they integrated?
Who is responsible for satisfaction and loyalty? Is responsibility
distributed across multiple groups or centralized in one organization?
Where does customer satisfaction/loyalty fall on the list of corporate
priorities? How committed is senior management to investing in the
program?
Should the program include a detailed analysis of the quality of
your delivery and ways you can improve it?
Once you have the answers to these questions, you'll want to conduct
secondary as well as primary research to identify best practices around
loyalty programs both within and outside your particular industry.
Great ideas can be found everywhere, and loyalty program owners are
often happy to share their knowledge and experiences, especially with
neutral third parties.
One group or organization should own the overall customer relationship
and loyalty program, ensuring that the program is fully integrated
with marketing, sales, delivery, and support.
In general, high-touch, content-rich, executive-level activities
are most effective for fostering loyalty.
The most important metrics used to evaluate the success of customer
relationship programs are revenue growth, repeat/follow-on business,
and loyalty/satisfaction indices.
After you've conducted your research into best practices, we also
recommend that you involve the account teams in the process, asking
them to talk to key customers to see what these customers want. For
example, do customers want more innovation seminars? More relationship-building
activities? More Webinars geared to their industry? With this kind
of direct input from customers, you can build a much stronger case
for your program. Further, involving the account teams in the process
helps secure their buy-in.
Armed with your best-practice findings and feedback from the account
teams and their top customers, you'll now be ready to design your program.
The critical elements in the program plan include:
Target audience
Marketing and other initiatives
Compensation and incentive changes
Roles and responsibilities
Timelines
Budget
Rollout strategy
Program metrics
Once the plan is in place, it will be important to train the people
who will implement the program and convince others in the company that
it is critical to their success. Be sure you don’t shortchange
this step. Your loyalty program success hinges on broad acceptance
and deep understanding. Once the training is completed, you will implement
your new program. Good luck!
Do you have a services marketing question? Visit Ask ITSMA to access
our experience, insight, and research results.
Congratulations to George Schoenstein of BearingPoint, Inc., who was
recently named the head of marketing for BearingPoint's Asia/Pacific
region. George is a longtime ITSMA member and a founding member of
ITSMA's Solutions Council. In his new role, he will manage all marketing
activities related to BearingPoint’s Asia/Pacific business.
We'd also like to extend a big welcome to Zack Baginski, ITSMA's new
summer intern. Zack, who will enter his senior year at Carnegie Mellon
this fall, will be assisting our marketing, research, and consulting
teams for the next three months. Please join us in welcoming him to
ITSMA.
Subscription Information
ITSMA E-ZINE is a monthly email newsletter that
provides highlights of new ITSMA research, analysis, ideas, tools,
and events relating to marketing and selling technology services and
solutions. ITSMA E-ZINE is available without charge and is
sent only to opt-in subscribers.
To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email us at unsubscribe@itsma.com or mail us at ITSMA
Subscriptions, 420 Bedford Street, Suite 110, Lexington, MA 02420,
USA.
Branch information for recipients located in Europe:
ITSMA, 8 Mount Ephraim, Tunbridge Wells, Kent. TN4 8AS. Company No:
FC023364 Branch No: BR006173. Branch registered in England and Wales.
VAT Number GB 840 4681 32.
Please forward this newsletter, but only in its entirety.
Public citation or publication of any information herein
is encouraged but subject to U.S. and international copyright law
and conventions. Any citation must include full attribution to ITSMA.
Individual graphics or paragraphs can be published without permission
as long as attribution to ITSMA is included. Publication of longer
selections or complete articles requires ITSMA permission. For permission
or more information, contact pr@itsma.com
![[ top ]](http://www.itsma.com/images/news/mtop.gif)
News & Notes